A blog dedicated to the discussion of topics relating to the history of Sandusky and Erie County, Ohio; inspired by the collections of the Sandusky Library Archives Research Center and Follett House Museum. A service of the Sandusky Library.

Monday, May 21, 2007

Thomas R. Koba, May 19, 2007

The community has lost a great advocate for local history: Tom Koba, historical filmmaker from Berlin Heights, died on Saturday, May 19. (For a complete obituary, see Monday's Sandusky Register.)

He produced several popular films on local history topics, including Rebel Fire Yankee Ice: The Johnson's Island Story and One Saturday Afternoon: The Story of the 1924 Lorain/Sandusky Tornado, as Told by the Survivors. (These titles and several others are available at the Sandusky Library.) Recently, he had presented a screening of one of his later films, Hotel Victory: Lake Erie's Grand Lady, at the Sandusky Library, and was planning to present his tornado film at the library in the near future.

His contributions to preserving the history of the community will be missed.

2 comments:

I remember Tom Koba as my Norwalk Junior High art teacher (and yearbook advisor) in 1968. While in high school, I had the pleasure of playing harmonica on the sound track of one of his lesser fun films about an attacking horde of giant vegetables, when he rented the WLKR-FM radio station's studio for an hour and he, (Norwalk High School guidance counselor) John Trier and I improvised for an hour or two under his direction.

Tom was not just a great historian, he was a great guy, and an inspiration to those of us lucky enough to know him.